Return to Bike Touring

It was now officially time to bid goodbye to Osaka.  As we ate our burritos at El Zocalo, I felt like a thief, a damn liar, and worst of all, a guy who hangs around the high school well after graduation.  We had already bid fond, tearful farewells to our friends (and the friendly staff of El Zocalo) eight months before when we left our jobs, our apartment and our lives in Osaka.  There were final nights out at karaoke, dinners, parties, and promises to have more fun on our return in December.  Then, after our California adventure, we made a triumphant return to Osaka just in time for Christmas.  We tore up the town and were met with warm wishes, lots of drinks, and free lodging from all of our friends.  Tearfully, we wondered why we ever left, and celebrated for two weeks with karaoke, dinners, parties, and promises to have still more fun on our return in March (and nostalgic burritos).

March came quickly, and once again we were greeted warmly by our friends, who still wondered aloud why we ever left, if slightly less enthusiastically than before.  Karaoke, etc., and great fun with great people, but that reality started to set in as we were spotted yet again in El Zocalo, explaining to the staff that, yes, we did go back to America and no, we still don't live in Osaka, we're just...passing through town kinda often.

Now it was the end of April, and our fifth time in Osaka since leaving the country eight months before.  Five burritos in eight months was a bit low for our average, but still enough to feel that we had never left.  By now, our oldest friends in Japan had left for other cities, other countries, and here we were again, having a blast, visiting with some amazing people, but wondering not why we ever left but if in fact we ever did.  It was time to get back on the road.

We have until June 4th to, in visa terms, gtfo of Japan before being tossed out by our collars and the seats of our pants.  In that time, we wanted more cycling, more WWOOFing, and no mountains.  We would get two of these three.


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This time, we would be crossing central Honshu the only way we could: pushing our bikes up more damn mountains.  After revisiting Takarazuka and, eventually, Tottori, we would follow the northwest coast of the island to Hamada, where we intend to WWOOF at some kind of artist's village/cafe/campground/organic farm.  From there, it's a quick (hopefully) ride to Shimonoseki, where we'll hop a ferry for Korea just ahead of the expiration of our visas at the beginning of June.  From there, we bike and WWOOF in Korea until our jobs (TBD) start up, when this blog will transmogrify back into an account of the day-to-day struggles of EFL teachers dealing with wacky students and cross-cultural kerfuffles.

There is, unfortunately, a dearth of information about biking across Honshu, so we've had to put together our own itinerary.  Google Maps is happy to plan out our route for us so long as we pretend that we're a car, which, despite the fact that we have four wheels, brakes, and several hundred pounds of attitude, we are not.  Will our sticktoitiveness and notgiveupedness carry us across this country?  Only time will tell.  Also, we have Clif Bars.

We left town after only a weekend in Osaka, stopping only to rest, tune up our bikes, and spend time with the inimitable Ellie Streichholz:

Osaka-Nara-Kyoto: A Three-Day Tour

Our biking career in Japan began as no good things do: with a phone battle with FedEx.  After an interminable with customs involving much use of the futuristic Japanese technology of the “fax machine,” our bikes were ours, which meant we were once again reunited with Gladys and Sally.  Then, of course, there was much celebration and a rousing performance of that great cyclist pantomime, “Goddamn Those Bike Shop Fuckers, I Can’t Believe They Charged Us for Shitty Work Like This.”  And thus was another of the world’s bike shops added to the Gaijin Shit List (joining the likes of Lawrence Cycle Works, Aeon Bicycles in Oji, and Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love).

A few days of hurried preparations followed, interrupted only constantly by torrential rain and many, many beers with friends.  This would be a trial run over somewhat familiar territory -- we had explored Nara and Kyoto with visiting family and friends many times by now -- with the end of ensuring that our equipment was all shipshape and ready for a long haul.

Shipshape-ish, anyway.

The first leg of the journey would settle a score of ours: our only previous bike experience in Japan was fixed to the Yamatogawa river, the one we had passed over on our daily commute hundreds of times, the one that wound its way up to Nara prefecture between Shigi-San and Mountain I Didn’t Bother to Look Up.

We started, as usual, late but in high spirits.  Our loads seemed to have exploded since we had ridden last, and this took a fair amount of getting used to; altogether our pace had slowed from “enthusiastic turtle” to “snail in no particular hurry.”  By the time the sun had mostly set behind us, we hadn’t made it quite as far as we would have liked, still on the Osaka side of the mountains.  We stopped at an anonymous, abandoned park along the side of the river: this would be a perfect chance to try free camping again, an activity we were only brave enough to attempt in the US on a foggy, pitch-black park dozens of miles from anything at all.  “This is Japan!” I reminded Jenn when she expressed concerns about being disturbed or axe-murdered in the night.  She helpfully reminded me of this, too, when I jumped at the sound of every blade of grass and ladybug fart in the night.  It was now, at about 6:00 on Day One, when we remembered the first thing we had forgotten to pack on this trip: a “coat.”

The river had dragged tons of litter into the trees, giving it a sort of haunted forest feeling.

Day Two began promisingly: in our haste to abandon our campsite before we were discovered by a Japanese person unafraid of confrontation (or another such mythological creature such as a Sasquatch), we were off and on our way at a new personal best of 8:30.  Then, of course, we had breakfast of Lawson, which has quickly become my new favorite diner, hardware store, coffee shop, and iPod charging station.  We passed through the mountains, passing farther to the east than we had ever been on our bicycles (if you ignore that California and Missouri are east of Japan).  The passage was none too difficult on the highway, and soon we were flying along the back roads of Nara Prefecture.  Imagine our dismay after hours of furious pedaling that we had only made it 30 kilometers.  We took the gathering clouds overhead as a sign from the Travel Gods that we really should break for a pizza, and took the deluge that followed as a further sign that we should take shelter at a hotel for the night.  Enigmatic, those Travel Gods.

Evidently we misinterpreted the signs we were given, for the next day we were given a bike path direct to Kyoto and a headwind that was matched for suckiness only by the 7° high for the day.  We pushed and grunted and pedaled all day down the dedicated bike path, chomping on Clif Bars and hydrating constantly, and for all the work we did we made less progress than Miss Gulch in a twister.  At last, the sun nearly gone, the air getting colder and the wind showing no signs of abating, we began to get desperate for somewhere warm to spend the night.

We found it in the southern end of Kyoto, hidden by a little-used train station in a tiny bedroom community: a ryokan, or Japanese-style inn, seemingly abandoned on the third floor of an old building above a supermarket.  I went in alone to scope it out: a tiny old woman, bent almost in half, walked the wide, dusty hallway alone.  She called to me, inviting us to stay the night for only ¥5000, quite a steal anywhere in Japan.  I agreed enthusiastically and rushed down to summon Jenn, who was busy minding the bikes and shivering.  We spent a good half hour lugging the bikes up a flight of stairs with everything still strapped to them, then securing them for the night.  A warm room, a restaurant across the street, and a hot bath -- clearly our prayers had been answered.

When we left to go to dinner, our charming old hostess asked for her payment.  “That’ll be ¥10,000,” she hummed.  I protested as strenuously as possible given all the life had been sucked out of me by that headwind, but all I got in return was, “OK, fine, you can leave.”  Realizing that there were no good options left to us, we paid and discussed the horrid old crone over dinner.

The next morning there came a frail banging on the door at 8:55.  I got up from breakfast and answered it, and the proprietress snapped at me that the room was only until 9 a.m., and that we had to pack up and go, for she had a bus to catch.  Incredulous, I agreed and closed the door.  Jenn reminded me of the woman’s age, but the more I thought of it as we shoved our things back into our bags, the angrier I grew.  I marched out into the hall to confront this crooked innkeeper (something for which six years of Japanese lessons had left me distinctly unprepared).

“Listen, we paid double what you quoted us at first!”  I began.

“There’s no time to argue, you have to leave right now,” she said.

“But...you’re being mean,” I tried (as far as I could tell, anyway).

“I’m not mean, get your things and go!”

Clearly I had her on the brink of capitulation, but Jenn stayed my wrath and we hurriedly carried our bags and our half-finished cups of yogurt down to the first floor, where we ate on the stairs and I fumed about this mistreatment.  We took our time finishing our breakfast, but oddly enough, the old woman never came down the stairs.  Could be she wrote off her bus as a lost cause, but I think it may have just been the 9:00 bus to Crazytown.

The day’s ride back to Osaka was a pleasant enough 40 kilometers, doable in a day even at our pace, though I take issue with Osaka prefecture’s decision to put steel barriers every 100 yards or so down the bike path.  I am comforted by the hardship of lifting our fully-laden bikes over these barriers only by my new bitchin’ biceps.

What I Learned On This Trip: don't argue with senility; bring a fucking coat!

Japan Recap Part 1: Osaka

It could be that I've been so terribly pleased with Osaka because of confirmation bias.  When we first moved here, I easily cobbled together a caricature of this city (nickname suggestion #1: The Big Pancake) from the few stereotypes and rumors I'd heard on the Internet and from otakus back home: it's loud, it's crass, it's dirty, it's tacky, the people are rude and overly concerned with money, it's where gangsters and comedians come from.  Basically, despite its second city status, in my mind I'd always built it up not as Chicago but as Jersey.

To recap: when we first moved to Japan, we were placed in an apartment right by Jenn's school, out in Tondabayashi City -- basically the Chesterfield, MO of Japan (or, in keeping with my earlier analogies, if Osaka is Chicago, Tondabayashi is Aurora or possibly Deerfield).  It seems like a fine place for people with children, dogs, and/or cars, but it was a bit sleepy for our tastes, so as soon as I found a job, we moved into the city proper.  Our apartment here is in Namba, certainly the happening-est part of one of the two most happening wards in Osaka, which means we got to be right in the heart of the big city (nickname suggestion #2: The Big 'Saka).  Despite having an hour-long commute each morning and evening, we haven't regretted moving to Namba at all.  We're a ten-minute walk from any of Osaka's best bars, restaurants, karaoke boxes, and gaijin hangouts...we want for nothing.  Truly, it is, as the Japanese say, la dolce vita.  Plus, the commute has given Jenn a chance to hone her sleeping-on-train skills to an almost Japanese level of expertise.

I guess, all said, I haven't learned much about the character of Osaka beyond those initial stereotypes, largely because I haven't lived anywhere else in Japan.  By Japanese standards, I guess it's dirty, but it's still Japan; people here sweep up the street in front of their businesses and wash the trash cans every day, tasks that no amount of money would persuade an American to do.  I suppose Osaka is dirtier than Kyoto, but then, Kyoto is so clean I'd be comfortable getting open heart surgery in the Kyoto subway.

Though there is the occasional fish head by the American consulate.  Ominous!

Some people are loud and crass, sure, but...yeah, again, Japan.  This is the country, if you'll remember, where you can get in trouble for demonstrating an insufficiently apologetic bow.  Crass for Japan is still more polite than any given...hm.  Well, I was going to give an example of something notoriously polite or helpful in America, but I find myself at a loss for examples.  More polite than a Minnesota wedding?

For instance, this man in Den-Den Town was nice enough to pause for a photo.  He said something about having plenty of...time.

Side note: I'd hoped that by studying Japanese here in Osaka, I'd learn to speak Osaka-ben, the brash, slangly Osaka dialect favored by Yakuza.  Thus, whenever I encountered a Japanese person outside Osaka, I would impress and intimidate them with my tough-guy way of speaking.   Unfortunately, having worked in a kindergarten for more than two years, I've been told that I speak more like a three-year old than a gangster.  *Sigh*

The toughest gang in town.

On the few occasions when we've gone to Tokyo, we were able to see what weirdness is native only to Osaka, and not to Japan as a whole.  Tokyo felt pretty boring, actually; everyone was wearing conservative clothes in conservatives colors (and let me just say as a word of warning to friends and family in America, I've gotten very used to dressing ridiculously).  Ultimately, I would say, Tokyo is much, much more ghettoized than Osaka, which makes the city feel...well, boring.  Everyone dresses the same because the freaks with the punk haircuts and the Lolitas with their boyfriends don't ride the same trains as the sarariimen going to work -- they stay in their ghettos in Akihabara or Harajuku with their own kind.  There's no Tokyo pride, no Tokyo Strut, as far as I can tell, because there's pride or a sense of identity within the smaller communities that sprinkle the megalopolis.

I gather that this is what makes Osaka so special within Japan, this sense of regional pride: rich or poor, old or young, all of Osaka comes together to take pride in their fried foods, their garish lit-up streets, and their terrifyingly powerful old women (Osakaobachan are described in guidebooks as "vigorous," "robust," and many other euphemisms for "loud, obnoxious to the point of violence, and generally badass").  After only three years here, I have more pride than I've had in anywhere else I've lived, though that may be due to St. Louis and Kirksville not putting up the stiffest competition.  I'm gonna miss this place, for sure.

To close, I'd like to share a couple of videos that capture the spirit of Osaka.  First, the outsider's perspective on our fascinating city, summed up beautifully by one of the best travelers out there (do watch part 2, as well, if you have time):

Osaka viewed from the vantage point of a boozy, coarse, sweaty old man.  Pretty much spot on!

...And then, the ultimate Osaka-poi video, full of plenty of Osaka dialect, food, and of course, the ridiculous clothes and hair that Osaka is famous for.  Most of this is set about 5 minutes from our house!  Sadly, the version with English subtitles has been taken down by some evil bastard, but trust me when I say that this song is as awesomely, authentically Osakan as it is impossible to sing at karaoke.  Ladies and gentlemen...zis izu Osaka Sutoratto!

I want that coat!